


(This Is) No Ordinary Love

by leftlanden



Category: Glee
Genre: F/F, Threesome - F/F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-12-01
Updated: 2014-11-30
Packaged: 2018-02-27 15:54:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,686
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2698688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leftlanden/pseuds/leftlanden
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Santana, Dani, and Rachel add some benefits to their friendship.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Before Santana could even register the shock of the cold wall against the skin of her bare back, Dani was on top of her, pushing her down on the bed, pulling the pillows out from under her to get her flat on her back. 

“I’ve been waiting for this all fucking night,” she murmured into Santana’s ear, sliding her hand inside her panties.  The warm, slick spot on Santana’s underwear coated the backs of her knuckles as she filled Santana with two fingers.

Santana dug her nails into the damp skin of Dani’s bare back.

“You looked so hot out there,” Dani whispered into Santana’s neck.  “I couldn’t wait to get you home and fuck you so hard.”

“You… too,” Santana panted, rolling her hips upward to take in Dani’s fingers up to the palm.  

“I wanted to take you right there on the dance floor,” Dani said, hovering over Santana, cradling the back of her head with one hand and stroking her insides with the other.

Santana nodded, eyes squeezed tight.  “Me too.”

Dani trailed her lips from Santana’s neck over her jawline to her lips.  “What did you like?”

Santana made a face that was half smile, half grimace.  How to summarize the hours of grinding on the dance floor that had put them into this particular mood?

“You just got so wet, Santana,” Dani whispered.  “What are you thinking about?”

Santana exhaled and pulled Dani by the hair down into a kiss.  

“I appreciate that, baby, but that’s not an answer,” Dani chided.  

Santana whimpered in protest as the fingers were withdrawn from her body and run through the hair of a suddenly upright Dani, who had risen to her knees and straddled Santana.  

“Was it this?” she asked.  

Santana gaped as Dani raised her hands to her head and ran her fingers backwards through her hair.  She arched her back just slightly, then raised herself a few inches above Santana, and rolled her hips in a slow circle.  Santana felt the tightness in Dani’s thigh muscles against her own.  As Dani lowered herself back down, she grazed Santana’s lower stomach with her stickiness, then lifted herself up again, repeating the motion.

“Is this what you were thinking about?”  

“Jesus Christ… Dani,” Santana said,   “Do that one more time, I’ll be done..you won’t get to feel it…”

“Mmm,” Dani said with a playful shrug.  “Just making sure I can still make your eyes roll back in your head without even touching you.”   

She smiled, lowering herself next to Santana once more.  “Plus, let’s be real, you know if I missed it I’d just give you another one.”

“Right,” Santana agreed.  Dani re-entered her roughly and Santana couldn’t think about anything other than the tight little strokes of her girlfriend’s fingertip against her g-spot and the rhythmic smack of her palm against her clit.  

The loft was empty tonight, so Santana let herself moan, a welcome change from nights of stifling herself, biting Dani’s palm.  The sounds came out of her strained, long and low.  Gradually they rose in pitch and shortened in duration until she was ready to let go and then…    

Then a deafening crash came from the bathroom.  

Santana screamed, and Dani bolted upright.  Santana’s eyes widened and she pulled the sheet up to her chin, searching Dani for an explanation.

“Is someone home?” Dani mouthed in the darkness, and Santana shook her head.  

“Work, rehearsal” she whispered.  “Did somebody break in?”

A small voice from the bathroom put an end to their fears.

“I, uh — sorry… sorry guys.”

Dani closed her eyes in relief and frustration.  

“Rachel??” Santana hissed at Dani, horrified.  “What the fuck, did you know she was home?”

“Um, no,” Dani said.  After thinking for a beat, she sat up on her knees and reached for last night’s t-shirt and a pair of underwear from the floor.  “I’ll be right back.”

“Hey, HEY, no!” Santana flailed for Dani’s wrist and missed.  “Are you kidding? You can kill Berry tomorrow when we’re done here.  Fuck, I’ll help, but right now you need to stay put.”

Dani pulled her t-shirt down over her head and stood up, pointing at Santana.  “Keep your hands above your waist until I get back.”

“No promises,” Santana murmured as Dani disappeared out the door.

***

Dani opened the door to the bathroom without knocking.

Rachel Berry, in a tiny pink nightgown, was scrambling about, trying to pick up the millions of bathroom items and toiletries that had fallen off the freestanding shelves that had somehow been knocked over.

“Sooo, everything okay in here?” Dani asked.

“Yes,” Rachel said, intently avoiding eye contact, busily picking up bottles of Kurt’s product from the floor.  “It’s fine, I just— I kicked over the shelves.”

“I see that.  How did that happen?”

“I’m t— I’m tired,” Rachel said,  not-casually resting her hands on her hips.  “Yeah, you know, I had a very long rehearsal and I got a little clumsy.  I’m very sorry for the.. for the, um, interruption.”

“Okay, well I appreciate that.  But wait, I’m confused.  How long have you been in here?” Dani asked.  “Because I didn’t even hear the door close.”

Rachel finally looked up and quickly averted her eyes when she realized Dani was naked from the hips down.  “I uhh— a few minutes.  I was trying to be really quiet.”

“Well… fail.”

“I said I was sorry.”

“Apology accepted,” Dani said, stooping to help Rachel clean up.  “But you know, you interrupted a pretty key moment.”

“Yes, Dani,” Rachel said, flushing a shade darker.  “I have ears so I realize that.  I’m embarrassed enough, okay?  So now that I’ve cleaned up the evidence can you please just let me run back to my room with my tail between my legs, and you can get back to… it.”  She emphasized the last word with a wave of her hand.

“Yeah, sure, of course.  Go ahead.”

“Thank you.”  Rachel sighed in relief and picked up her towel and bathrobe from the floor.  

“You’re right, though,” Dani said, stepping sideways to block Rachel’s path to the door.  “You must be really embarrassed, cause you’re super flushed.  A little sweaty, even.”

Dani grinned.  Rachel flattened her lips.

“Dani you fucking bitch, get back in here!” Santana called out, voice thick with frustration.

Seeing an out, Rachel tried to push past Dani and out the door.  As she passed by, Dani grabbed her right hand.  

“Hey, no hard feelings,” she said, holding onto Rachel’s hand, massaging her fingers ever so slightly.  “These things, they happen to all roommates.”

“Well.  Thank you for understanding,” Rachel said, glancing uncomfortably at their clasped hands.

“But Rachel, I interrupted you, here in the bathroom,” Dani replied.  “Santana can wait another minute or two.  Are you sure you don’t need to like, wash your hands or anything?”

Rachel snatched her hand away and scurried out the door.

Dani’s grin stayed on her face all the way back to Santana’s bed.

“Oh my God, thank God,” Santana said, visibly writhing under the covers.  “You have ten seconds, bitch, or I’m finishing this myself. Wait, what’s so funny?”

Dani put her hands on her cheeks, shook her head, and doubled over laughing.

“Dani?”

Dani sat down on the bed next to Santana.

“Dani, what the hell happened in that bathroom?”

Dani took her hands from her face and grasped Santana’s.  “Santana… your roommate…”

“Would you spit it out, for the love of God, woman?  I could punch through concrete right now.”

“Your roommate was listening to us.”

Santana drew her hands away and furrowed her brow.  “Wait, Rachel?  Like, on purpose?”

“Uh, yeah,” Dani said, nodding vigorously.

Santana’s face cycled through puzzled, amused, and angry, then settled back on puzzled.  “But… why?”

“Santana,” Dani said, searching for a tactful way to put this.  “She was…”

“She was what?”

Dani raised her eyebrows and lowered her right hand to her lower abdomen.  She moved her hand in a circular motion.

“WHAT?”  Santana stood up.  “No way.  Did you SEE her?  No way.”

“Shhhhhh, Santana.  No, but trust me, I know.”

“No way,” Santana said in a whisper.  “Why would she do that?”

“I don’t know.  I think I have to go find out, though.”

“You’re crazy.  Wait!  Dani, for fuck’s sake put some PANTS on, I can see your ass!”

Dani disappeared out the door still wearing only her t-shirt and underwear, and Santana flounced back against the pillows in a huff.  “Son of a bitch,” she muttered as she got up, pulled on her robe, and followed a few seconds behind.

**

Dani knocked softly on the wall next to Rachel’s corner of the loft.

“Rachel?”

Rachel sighed heavily.  “Yes?  Dani, what now?”

 “Hey, can I come in?  I’m not like … interrupting anything, am I?” Dani asked as she pulled aside the curtain and entered Rachel’s room.  Rachel was sitting in bed.  

 “Dani, please, I said I was sorry,” she said, closing her laptop and resting her forehead in her hands.

 “No, I know,” Dani said, smiling and sitting on Rachel’s bed next to her.  She gave her a reassuring pat on the knee through her blankets.  “That’s not why I’m here.”

 Rachel glanced down at Dani’s bare legs resting on the bed next to her, then averted her eyes to various points around the room..  “Okay, then why?”

“Well, you see, Rachel, I’ve been with my share of girls.”

 “Oh..kay.  Well, how nice for you, Dani.”

 “Totally, it was,” Dani said with a nod.  “But no, you know what the thing is?  How they’re all different.  Isn’t that funny?  Like how some girls can have all the same parts or whatever, but every girl is a little different when they’re… I don’t know, ready to go, you know?  Turned on?  Worked up?”

 “Yes.  Yes, okay, I get it.”

 “They sound different,” Dani continued, “They feel different.  They smell different.”

 Rachel’s right wrist fidgeted uncomfortably beneath her right thigh.  “Dani, other than making me more embarrassed than I already was, what is your point right now?”

“My point is that I know what you were doing in that bathroom.”

Rachel shrugged nonchalantly.  “I wasn’t doing anything except getting ready for bed.”

“We both know that’s not true, Rachel.  I came in here hoping you would tell me why.”

Rachel studied Dani’s face, which was amused… but quite certain.  And she was forced to accept that Dani wasn’t bluffing.  She scrunched herself down beneath the blankets and pulled them up over her head.

“Can you just please not tell Santana, okay?” came Rachel’s muffled voice.  “I’ll never hear the end of it.”

Dani opened her mouth to reply, but did not get the chance.

 “Oh, it’s too late for that,” Santana declared, sauntering into Rachel’s room.  “And you’re right, you won’t.  For SO many reasons.  But first, I think my girlfriend’s question demands an answer.  I mean, why Rachel, when they have websites for this sort of thing?  Or does it have to be real-life, flesh-and-blood voyeurism?  Because I think that information should have been disclosed before Lady Hummel or I agreed to live with you.  And you know, I just shudder to think of all those unsuspecting chorus singers and swing cast members subjected to your prying gaze every day and night in their communal dressing rooms after rehearsals, not to mention —”

 “Santana, please stop,” Rachel said, sitting up and throwing off the blankets. She flushed a shade darker still, laying eyes on Santana’s disheveled appearance.

 “I can see,” she continued, “That the two of you are not going to let me gracefully retreat into my humiliation, so let me be the grownup here.  I’m sorry.  Okay?  I’m sorry for my inappropriate behavior.  It’s never happened before, I promise you, and it was an accident.”

 “An accident?” Santana repeated.  “You tripped and fell and landed on your index finger for 20 minutes?”

 Rachel closed her eyes.  “No.  Look, you guys burst through the apartment door drunk and ripping each other’s clothes off.  It was totally inconsiderate.  What was I supposed to do?”

 Dani and Santana gave each other not-entirely-sheepish smiles.  

 “I was in the bathroom already. I was going to be polite and sneak out at an opportune moment,” Rachel continued.

 “And then?” Dani asked, grinning.  “How come the plan changed?”

 Rachel sighed heavily.  “If you must know, I’ve been a little…  frustrated, lately.  All right?  I can admit that.  It hasn’t felt right to meet anyone new since I lost — since…  Anyway, even if it did, I’m so busy with being Fanny and NYADA and work, I wouldn’t have time to meet someone.  So, I heard… I heard sex, okay?  And it just happened.  It wasn’t personal, so don’t flatter yourselves.  Especially you,” she said, side-eyeing Santana’s smirk.

 Dani took a moment to absorb Rachel’s speech, then took Santana by the wrist.  “Can I have a word with you?” she asked, pulling her past the curtain and out of Rachel’s room.

 “Just leave me alooooone,” Rachel moaned, re-covering herself with her comforter as they exited.

 “Oh my God, Dani, this is the best blackmail I’ve ever had, and it just fell right in my lap,” Santana said breathlessly as they retreated into the hallway.  “This is a glorious night.  Not that I get off on tormenting her anymore, but come on, there are so many ways to use this against her, I’m gonna need a spreadsheet just in case.”  She paused.  “Wait, why are you looking at me like that?”

 Dani was smiling, wheels turning furiously in her mind.

 “What’s going on with you?” Santana asked warily.

 “She would,” Dani said, finally reaching the firm conclusion in her head.

 “Would what?” Santana asked, puzzled, before catching on.  “Oh, bull shit.”

 “Totally,” Dani insisted.

 “Okay, Ms. Lesbian Guru.  Whatever you say.  But I wouldn’t, so it’s moot,” Santana said, crossing her arms over her chest.  “Wait.. would you?”

 Dani turned one corner of her mouth up and shrugged.  

 “You said she wasn’t your type!”

 “Sometimes my type is hot.”

 “Ugh,” Santana said, rolling her eyes.

 “Some things are undeniable, babe.”

 “Okay.  No.  This is a ridiculous conversation,” Santana said, putting her hands in the air.  “What alternative universe is this?  You’ve clearly had too much tequila, so I’m just gonna get back in bed, take this robe off, and wait for you to finish what you started and then abandoned in order to talk crazy about our horny little troll of a roommate.”

 Dani leaned toward Santana and put a finger on her lips.  “Methinks thou doth protest too much.  Just like she is,” she said, cocking her head toward Rachel’s room.

 Santana’s gaze followed Dani’s gesture.  “She’s straight,” Santana said weakly.

 “Oh, my bad,” Dani said.  “I forgot sexuality is set in stone and no one ever experiments.  Especially not you with your old friends from high school, ever.”

 Santana pursed her lips.  “I didn’t live with Quinn.  Or work with her.  Or play in a band with her.  You don’t think that even if you’re right about Rachel — which you’re not — that things might not get a little, I don’t know, awful and awkward afterwards?”

 Dani shrugged.  “You’re still friends with Quinn, aren’t you?”

 “That’s different.”

 Dani nodded, and took Santana by the shoulders.  “Babe, listen.  I get that.  But did you hear what she said in there?  She’s clearly lonely.  And I don’t think she knows how to fix it.  She’s also clearly into us, no matter what she says with her mouth.  It might be good for her, being with us for a minute. Why can’t she have a little fun?  Sometimes one good night can change everything.”

 Santana looked thoughtfully at Rachel’s closed curtain.  “She has been hella depressing lately.”

 “Yeah.  And guess what, it could be super fun for us, too.  I know you’ve never had a threeway before, babe, so let me paint you a little picture here:  We do this, and you could be the filling in a sandwich where your super hot girlfriend and your forbidden high school crush are the bread.”

 A faraway look came over Santana’s face.  She swallowed.  

 “You’re fucking evil,” she said pointing her index finger in Dani’s face.

 “An evil genius, maybe.  Santana, you won’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.  I’ll take the lead and you just… see how you feel.”

 Santana nodded.  

 “So if I go in there and ask her, and she says yes, you’re in?”

 Santana closed her eyes tightly.  She nodded again.

 “Awesome,” Dani grinned.  “I’ll go talk to her.  Why don’t you go in the kitchen and get the vodka out of the freezer.  Have a shot, and bring a glass for Rachel in case she wants it.  Okay?”

 “All right, whatever, but she’s not going to say yes.”

 “We’ll see.”  Dani smacked Santana’s ass as she headed off to the kitchen.

 

**

“Sooooo, I’m back,” Dani said, bounding through Rachel’s curtain.

“Of course you are,” Rachel said wearily, flouncing back against her pillows, staring at the ceiling.  “So what were you two doing out there, concocting blackmail plans?  Do I have to do the dishes every day until we move out, or what?  Because I pretty much do that anyway.”

“Santana had some plans like that,” Dani admitted.  “But, I was having different ideas.” She sat down again on Rachel’s bed.

“And what ideas would those be.”

“Welllll,” Dani said, “I was thinking how there are two girls in this apartment who, just a few minutes ago, managed to both interrupt each other at pretty key moments.  Which is like, so frustrating, right?  And that’s just not good, is it, Rachel?  That kind of tension in the air makes people cranky and frustrated, and then they yell at their roommates about, say, toothpaste splatters on the mirror or blobs of cheese in the microwave.”

“I buy paper towels for a reason, Dani. Santana needs to learn to use them.”

“Yeah, no, that’s fair,” Dani conceded.  “Aaaanyway, I was just thinking about our little situation here and wondering if maybe the three of us could, somehow, help each other out.”

Rachel narrowed her eyes.  “Help each other out?”

“Uh huh,” Dani answered.

Rachel stared, bewildered. “Dani?  Are you propositioning me?”

Dani nodded.  “I am, yeah. But it’s okay, I’ll give you a minute.”  Dani folded her hands in her lap and waited.

Rachel stared at her open-mouthed long enough that Dani was afraid she’d broken her.

 "Is Santana in on this?” Rachel asked finally.

 “If you mean did I ask her if she was interested first, of course.  Rachel, I’m not going to invite a girl for a threeway without running it by my girlfriend.”

 “Okay wait.  Just wait,” Rachel said, closing her eyes and waving her hands in front of her.  “You asked Santana.  Santana Lopez?  About a threeway.  With me.  And she said yes?”

 “I wouldn’t be here if she didn’t.”

 The stare returned.  

 “For the record, I notice that you haven’t said no yet,” Dani said, slightly uncomfortable with the open-mouthed gaping.  “Just all these questions about Santana.”

 “Well then, first of all, NO,” Rachel said, loudly.  “Second of all, what’s her angle?  Is this part of her blackmail plot?”

 Dani shrugged.  “I think she just wants to have a little fun.”

 “With me?”  Rachel had stood up from the bed. “Santana’s only idea of fun with me is going shopping to mock all of my fashion choices or watching tv shows and telling me all the characters I’d totally be wrong for if I ever went into television.”

 Dani stood up.  “All right, Rachel, if that’s the way you see it, I’m not going to argue with you.”

 “Well it’s true, isn’t it?  This can’t be for real.”

 “Rachel, look,” Dani said,  “I get that this feels a little… weird.  But I’m not bullshitting you when I say I’ve been where you are.  I mean not exactly, but I’ve sure as hell been super lonely.  Sometimes when you’re in that place it’s nice to connect, even just for a night.  But,” Dani continued, standing up from the bed.  “I have to say, I’m way not into pressuring anyone, so I’m out.”

 She headed out of the room, but paused in Rachel’s doorway curtain on her way out.

 “Just one more thing, though„” she said over her shoulder.  “If you liked the way Santana sounded?  Like, enough to kick over furniture?  Just imagine how she feels.”

 Rachel didn’t have a reply.

 “If you change your mind, we’ve got vodka, cinnamon vanilla candles, and plenty of room under the blankets,” Dani continued.  

 And then she was gone.  Rachel sat down alone in her bed.

 

**

 Santana sat alone in her bed, too.  Her spine stood straight and stiff, her eyes opened wide, her ears perked for any signs of footsteps.

 Okay, there they were.  She held her breath, did a quick analysis.  Only one person.  Too relaxed to be Berry.  It was Dani.  Alone.  

 “I told you,” Santana said when Dani appeared, feeling her body relax by several orders of magnitude.

 “Let’s have a drink,” Dani said, picking up the lighter next to the candles on the dresser.

 “I already did.”

 “Let’s have another one.”

 Once the candles were lit, they clinked their shot glasses and threw back their shots, sitting cross-legged together on Santana’s bed.  

 “So, you’re totally stalling,” Santana said, wincing at the burn of the vodka.  “What happened in there?  She needed time to think?  Call her agent? What?”

 “No, she said no.”

 “And you’re killing time because you think she’s going to change her mind.”

 “Indeed I do,” Dani said.

 “Well, how long am I supposed to wait?  There hasn’t been blood in my brain for half an hour now, that can’t be good for a person.”

 “We don’t have to wait at all if you don’t want to.”

 “I won’t be able to finish knowing Berry could stroll on in at any moment.”

 “Care to make a wager on that?” Dani asked, raising one eyebrow.

 Santana smiled.  “…No.”

 No sooner did their lips touch was there was a knock on the wall right outside Santana’s room.  

 Dani flashed an “I told you so” grin, but it was lost on a re-petrified Santana.  

 “Rachel, what a surprise,” Dani said, pulling back the curtain.

 Rachel, who had been waiting for her cue, launched into her prepared monologue.

 “I have two main areas of justification for this,” she said, striding into the room.  “The first is ‘live for the moment’, with the parenthetical notation ‘hope you don’t regret it tomorrow and for the rest of your life.’”  

 “What’s the other one?”  Dani asked after an unnaturally long silence during which it became clear that Rachel was waiting for a prompt before continuing.  

 “The other one, Dani, is…  Well, let’s just say someone in this room has been given stellar reviews for experimentation purposes that have left me skeptical, but intrigued.  Anyway, here I am, and I’d just like to note that I wish I’d shaved my legs more recently, but it’s too late now.  But you’re women, which is.. you know, it’s great!  Because you understand.  Presumably.  Because you’re women.”  She paused, swallowed, and sighed.  “You’re women.  Anyway, how does this work?”

 “How about a drink?” Dani asked.

 “Yes, please.”

 Santana cleared her throat.  “Wait, so, did Quinn use the word ‘stellar’ or did you Berrify that?”

 “Babe, shh.  Here you go, Rachel.”

 Rachel downed a shot of vodka and stuck her arm back out toward Dani, downed the second one too, and set her glass firmly down on the dresser.

 “Okay. I’m ready.  Where’s my mark?”

 Santana looked at Dani.  “Do you see what you’ve gotten us into?  She’s probably invited a choreographer.”

 “I think,” Dani said, taking Rachel by the hand and leading her over to the bed, “That both of you guys need to just… chill… a little bit.  C’mere, Rachel, I think I can help with that..”  She sat down and patted the bed in front of her.  “Did I ever tell you I give really amazing backrubs?”

 “N-No.”

 “Well, I do.  Do you want to see?”

 Rachel glanced nervously at Santana, who looked about at terrified as Rachel felt, which was somehow oddly reassuring.  She sat down on the bed in front of Dani.

 “All right.”

 “Awesome,” Dani said, and swept Rachel’s hair off her shoulders and to one side.  “Let me know what feels good.”

 “Ohhh my God,” Rachel said almost immediately, closing her eyes and relaxing her posture as Dani’s fingers kneaded her neck and shoulders, and the warm vodka buzz filled her head.  “That, do that.”  She really hadn’t felt someone else’s hands in so, so long.

 “Okay,” Dani said, smiling reassuringly at Santana, who still sat stiffly next to them.  “Why don’t you lay on your belly, Rachel?”

 Rachel gingerly placed herself along the edge of Santana’s bed.  Literally as far from Santana as she could be without plummeting to the floor.

 “So where do you hold your tension, Rachel?” Dani asked softly as her hands worked up and down Rachel’s neck.  “What spots should I hit?”

 A small noise — a giggle despite herself — escaped Santana’s throat.  

 “Along my spine,” Rachel admitted hesitantly.  “In the middle.  Those muscles get so sore from dance classes.”

 “Totally,” Dani said.  “I think I need to move your nightgown to reach those.  That okay?”

 “I— okay.”

 Dani lifted Rachel’s nightgown and ran her hands up Rachel’s back.  She rolled her thumbs over the long, lean muscles of Rachel’s back.  Encouraged by Rachel’s groan, Dani swung one leg over her body and sat on Rachel’s upper thighs.  

 Suddenly, it was not relaxing anymore.

 Rachel was immediately aware of dampness and body heat against her ass, and a little trill flared in the pit of her stomach.

 Is that what girls feel like?  Oh, it was strange.  No firmness pressing into her, rife with expectation… just, soft and hot.  There was some minor panic happening.  But with Dani’s hands working up and down her back from her neck to her ass, it was really hard to sustain any worry about anything.  The hands were good, and the damp heat against her ass was good, too.  

Eventually, she became dimly aware that there was only one hand on her back.  

 It was dragging fingernails up and down the length of her spine and sweeping from side to side across her hips, right at the elastic of her underwear -- not really a back rub anymore.

 The other hand, the one that had gone away, it was, where?  

 Rachel turned her head and opened the eye not buried in Santana’s comforter.  The missing hand was on Santana’s back.  

 It was pressed into the small of Santana’s back, actually, holding her against Dani.  

 There was kissing.  Also, there was Santana’s thigh against hers, which she hadn’t noticed before.  And really, how many times had that happened?  A million times on the couch, on the subway coming home at night? So that was not a big deal, totally not at all.

 But also there was — oh, god, now there was pressure.  There was pressure from Dani’s hips, her dampness, down against Rachel’s ass.  First it was constant, then it was rhythmic, as the kissing that was happening a few feet above her head picked up momentum.

 Then Santana moaned a stifled moan into Dani’s mouth and Rachel jolted, and the heat of Dani’s body moved away.  

 Rachel rolled to her side in time to see Dani pull her t-shirt off over her head, in time to see Dani’s breasts land softly on Santana’s robe as the two of them closed the angle between themselves and the bed.  Dani reached down and loosened the knot holding the robe shut, and then there was one of Santana’s breasts, the curved ridges of her ribcage, the smooth tan and soft brown of their bellies pressed together, inches from Rachel’s face.  

 Santana glanced Rachel’s way, and moved her arm to cover partially her exposed breast, but then Dani sucked on a spot on her neck and her arm fell away.  It took Rachel a second to notice Dani’s outstretched hand was reaching for her.

 Dani guided her onto her back, tugged her closer to Santana.  

 “Are you okay?” she bent down to whisper into Rachel’s ear.  Her voice was raspy, her lips fiery red.

 Her hair fell over them both as she spoke.  It felt very hidden, very safe.  

 “Yeah,” Rachel whispered back.  

 “I’m gonna be back in a minute, okay?”

 “Okay.”

 It also took Rachel a second to notice when Dani started fucking Santana, and thinking back on it, this was no doubt intentional.  The blanket made the movement hard to see, but the sound, after a moment, was unmistakable.  Rachel’s body went hot, and she flattened herself against the bed, willing herself to disappear.  

 “You okay, Rachel?” Dani panted, voice straining.  Dani reached over and took Rachel’s hand with the one that wasn’t busy.

 Rachel peeked over the blanket and saw Dani dimly in the candlelight, grimacing slightly with effort, eyelids heavy, then seeing Rachel looking and managing to smile at her.  Santana, who had been whimpering and sighing in time with the sound of her body taking Dani’s fingers, tensed, re-aware that Rachel lay a few inches away.

 “Stay with me, babe,” Dani whispered, her attention back on Santana,.  “Look at me, look at me. Just me.”

 Soon after, there was a moment when Santana went suddenly silent and Dani closed her eyes in pure pleasure, then smiled.  When she opened them, she looked right at Rachel, except through her, really.  An instant later when Santana let out a guttural moan and then relaxed, Rachel understood that look had meant  _victory_.

Rachel shivered.  

Dani was kissing Santana softly, laying mostly on top of her, Santana’s arms wrapped around her neck.  Dani held tightly, still, to Rachel’s hand.

Rachel wasn’t looking at them, feeling like an intruder even though she’d been invited, so when Dani’s lips brushed the pads of the fingertips of her right hand she startled a little.  She turned her head in time to see her index finger disappear halfway inside Dani’s lips.  

Dani made eye contact, then closed her eyes.  “Does that feel good, Rachel?” she asked after she finished dragging the length of it through her lightly clenched teeth.

“Mmmfff.”

She smirked, sat up, and massaged the length of Rachel’s finger with her tongue.

Rachel allowed her eyes to roll back, then close.

As Dani finished and moved on to the next finger, Santana recovered enough to sit up too, leaning against Dani’s left side.  She watched Dani’s mouth work up and down Rachel’s fingers.  She brushed Dani’s hair out of the way and put soft kisses against her girlfriend’s jaw as its muscles worked.

When Dani finished sucking on Rachel’s pinky finger, she turned her head toward Santana, meeting her in a kiss.  Simultaneously, she pulled at Rachel’s arm, helping her to a sitting position.

She put two fingers underneath Rachel’s chin to draw her mouth in closer, then turned from Santana’s lips to Rachel’s.

Dani’s kiss was decisive; her tongue parted Rachel’s lips right away, her fingers wove into the hair at the nape of Rachel’s neck.  

“Good?” Dani broke the kiss to ask.

“Yeah,” Rachel said, and then Dani was kissing her again.

Then Dani turned her head to kiss Santana.  Rachel wobbled a little, dizzy, and slumped backwards.  Dani’s arm wrapped around her waist to keep her upright, and close.  

When Dani’s lips came back they found Rachel’s neck, and Rachel found herself going limp against Dani’s arm, her hips shifting uncomfortably against Dani’s body.  She put her hand down on the bed to steady herself and caught a graze of Santana’s nipple on the way down.

“Sorry,” she muttered.

“It’s okay,” Santana said quickly.

“Do you want to kiss her?” Dani whispered into Rachel’s ear.  And despite the fact that her earlobe was in Dani’s mouth, Rachel’s eyes flew open.  Santana was naked.  And she was inches away, leaning on Dani and watching them, digging her nails into Dani’s shoulders.  Her lips were full and probably hot and soft, but here was no trace of what answer Rachel should give apparent on her face, just a steady stare that Rachel couldn’t quite bring herself to meet.  

Rachel shook her head.

“Do you want me to touch you?” Dani asked.

To this, Rachel said yes, because that was so, so much easier.

Her nightgown got lifted over her head, the process started by Dani and finished by Santana, who tossed it over her shoulder and followed as Dani pushed Rachel onto her back.  

So that was the first time Rachel felt other breasts against hers and god it was weird, so weird.  And Dani was bigger than her but not by much and that felt weird, too, like she was covered but still not, but also —  sweet mother of God how could a person be so precise with her thigh?  Rachel’s knees fell open.  

Usually Rachel found her hands running over hard, broad shoulders at a moment like this, or maybe trailing across a muscled chest, or running through short, rough hair with nothing to sink her fingers into.  

This was a wonderland of choices she had never been to before.  

There was hair falling around them to be brushed back, and lots of it to hold onto while the tongue in your mouth was making your toes curl.  There were boobs squished against hers that she could lightly trace the sides of, fascinated by the feel of ones that weren’t her own.  And most of all there was a sweet, sexy curve into hips and ass right at the perfect place for her hands to fall, and the skin there was warm and a little damp and just so soft for pressing fingertips into.    

When, well into being pressed hard into the bed by Dani and her mouth, Rachel dared to slide a fingertip beneath the elastic of the back of Dani’s underwear, she discovered Santana liked touching that particular area, too.  She pulled her hand away like she’d touched a hot stove.

Eventually, Dani rolled onto Rachel’s left side, facing Santana who lay on her right.  Without saying a word, they each grabbed Rachel’s underwear at the hips and slid them down, down, and off.  Santana threw those over her shoulder as well.

Dani opened Rachel up at the top and shot fire through Rachel’s body with a few flicks of her fingertip.  

A few well placed circles and sweeps later, Rachel already felt the muscles in her abdomen and legs tensing.  She breathed deeply, willing the blood back to her brain.  She would never hear the end of it if she came that fast.  

As Rachel willed herself to calm down, she noticed that Santana was on the move.  She crossed over Rachel and settled in behind Dani, and the moment Dani’s eyes squeezed shut and her mouth fell open, Rachel knew Santana was inside her.

She watched as Dani rolled her hips back and forth to meet Santana’s strokes, marveling that somehow Dani’s finger was still right on target at the sensitive apex of her clit.  

Until it wasn’t.  If it was a race for results, Santana was winning it.  Dani was touching herself now instead of Rachel, her head thrown back, resting on Santana’s shoulder, her tits and belly pushed up against Rachel.  

Blearily, Rachel felt as though she should be doing something to contribute, but what was the best thing to do was an unknown to her.  On instinct, she rolled from her back onto her side to face Dani, and reached out and put her hand against the side of her face.  She was rewarded with a brief, flushed, smile and a quick kiss against her wrist.  Dani reached over her head to grab Santana’s hair with one hand.  

And with the other, she ran her nails down Rachel’s back as she came.

Oh.  

Rachel supposed she had known that she wasn’t going to hate this.  

But with that little sound that escaped her lips while another woman climaxed against her body, a heavy realization seeped into the pit of her stomach, which was that she really,  _really_ didn’t hate this.  And there it swirled, mixing with the aching fire Dani had put there with her fingertips.  

Dani was breathing heavily and kissing Santana, who was smiling and still stroking her between her legs.  They were so comfortable that it was terrifying, and Rachel, desperate though she was, thought of leaving for the fiftieth time that night.     

And then without a word, Dani rolled onto Rachel’s right side and Santana settled in on her left.  And Rachel finally felt herself brave enough to look Santana in the face, right before Dani put two fingers on either side of Rachel’s clit and started rubbing, up and in, up and in.  

Rachel gasped and flailed her arms at the sudden intensity.  She didn’t grab Santana’s hand on purpose, but when her brain tuned in again, she became aware she was squeezing it so hard it hurt, on the bed beside her hip.

Dani leaned forward and whispered into Rachel’s mouth.

“Do you want to kiss her now?”

“She’s never going to say yes to that, Dani,” Santana murmured.

“Now when did I hear that before, huh?” Dani retorted with a wink.  

What Santana didn’t know was how frustrated Rachel was.  Dani was doing this almost-right-on-it thing on purpose, and Rachel knew it, because it sure as hell wasn’t what she had been doing before.

She shifted her hips impatiently and in response Dani gave her one certain stroke right there, and she moaned in satisfaction.  Then it was gone, off center again, so close and so, so far..  

“Yes,” Rachel found herself saying, frustration showing itself in the growl of her voice.  “YES.  Please!”

Dani smiled.

 "She said yes, babe,” she said with a wink at Santana.

 Dani stopped and moved her hand out of the way, resting it on Rachel’s lower belly.  Santana shifted her weight toward Rachel.

 Her breast touched Rachel first, resting right in the middle of her chest.  Her arm was next, tucking itself snugly against Rachel’s side, fingers curling slightly underneath Rachel’s shoulder.

 She leaned down and her hair fell, landing on Rachel’s chest.  Her lips stopped just millimeters above Rachel’s.  Rachel stared up at those lips, and her chin lifted, expecting.  Santana drew back, almost imperceptibly.  Rachel emitted a tiny little grunt of frustration.  

 “What?” Santana asked, but without a trace of an actual question in her voice.

 Rachel craned her head back into the bed and rolled her hips toward Santana, putting her center into direct contact with the warm skin of Santana’s thigh.

 “God, Moses, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” Santana muttered, and rolled her head back, smiling in surprise at the ceiling.  

 Dani giggled.  “Nice, Rachel.”

 Decisively, Rachel wrapped her right arm around Santana’s waist and her right leg around Santana’s top thigh.

 There was a second — no, less than that, there was an instant — of eye contact.  There was an instant for fingernails digging in in surprise and a gasp of breath into each other’s mouths.

 And then there was a kiss.  An open mouth on hers, Santana’s tongue grazing hers.  Santana’s hand on her face.  The weight of her body.  The firmness of her thigh between Rachel’s legs.  Santana smelled different from this close.  Still like her, just more of it.  Heavier.    

 Rachel didn’t know how long this kissing had been going on.  Santana had been laying on top of her body for hours, for all she knew.  Soft breasts, bony hips, long legs pinning hers down.  Lips.  Open mouth.

 It felt like the world was ending when Santana went away.  

 “Look how wet she is,” Dani was saying to Santana, running her fingertips lightly over Rachel’s opening and clit.  

 Rachel stared at Santana’s mouth; Santana watched Dani’s hand between Rachel’s legs.  Dani slid Rachel’s sticky curls between her index finger and thumb and coated a line of skin from Rachel’s clit to her belly button in slickness.  

 Rachel breathed fast and shallow at the touch of cool fingertips against the fire between her legs.

 “Yeah, I’ve been feeling that,” Santana said, indicating her left thigh with a glance.

 “She’s ready,” Dani said.

 “Yeah,” Santana whispered to Dani.  

 Dani opened Rachel with her fingers.

 “Go ahead,” she encouraged.  

 Santana slid a finger inside Rachel.

 Rachel covered her face with her hands.  

 “How does that feel, Rachel?” Dani was asking, leaning forward to purr the question into her ear.  

 “Yes,” Rachel choked out, and Dani laughed gently.  

 “How does she feel, Santana?” Dani asked, but asked it into Rachel’s ear, all the while rolling Rachel’s clit in a tiny circle with her fingertip.

 “Soaking wet,” Santana said, and Rachel moaned.

 “Yeah,” Dani whispered.  “Fuck her faster, Santana.”

 So Santana fucked her faster, and Dani was making these long upward strokes over her clit at the same time, and suddenly Rachel understood why people needed a safe word, because fuck that was intense. That was before Santana even added the second finger.

 “How does she feel now, Santana?” Dani was asking, sitting back on all fours again, whispering into Santana’s ear, sucking on her neck.

 “Almost there,” Santana said, her brow furrowed in concentration.

 “Yeah, I can tell, just listen to her,” Dani said.  “You sound fucking sexy, Rachel.”

 Rachel hadn’t known she was making any noise.

 “I love how girls sound when they come, don’t you?” Dani asked Santana, tongue parting her lips into a rough kiss as she finished the question.  .

 “Jesus,” Santana said, breaking the kiss as Rachel squirmed beneath her.

 “Let’s finish her off,” Dani said breathlessly.  “Rachel, time to come for us. Tell her, Santana.”

 Santana put her lips against Rachel’s ear.  

 “Come on, Rachel,” she whispered.  “Come on.”

 And after all of it, after the kissing and the fucking, the moaning, the skin sliding, smacking against damp skin — it was that whispered coaxing, melting gently into Rachel’s ear in Santana’s heavy, rasping urge, that demand, that give me this, was what turned Rachel’s burn, her agony, her writhing, into release, into rest… into relief.

 

**

 When Santana and Dani fucked again, wound tight from their efforts with Rachel, it was fast this time.  Clutching a pillow, Rachel watched their silhouettes as Santana got taken roughly on all fours (twice), her hair wrapped around Dani’s fist, and then she watched as Santana made Dani’s back arch, her legs wrapped around Santana’s neck.  

 Afterwards, they asked her what she needed and she was too shy to say, “everything you just did,” so they wound up going to sleep.  Rachel thought that maybe she should leave and sleep in her own bed, but when she got up to go to the bathroom Dani asked if she was coming back so expectantly that she just… did.  

 The spot they left for her in the bed was between Santana and the wall.  Santana was the little spoon, Dani’s body cradled protectively around her.  Rachel tucked herself under the covers and immediately felt Santana’s arm drape over her bare stomach, punctuated by a little tug at Rachel’s hip with her fingertips.  

 So Rachel turned to her side and snuggled backwards until there were breasts pressed against her back.

 Santana sighed sleepily and rested her arm across Rachel’s waist.

 Rachel lay awake for a while, feeling the rise and fall of Santana’s chest and the little twitches of her muscles relaxing into sleep.

 

**

 A few hours later, the loft filled with the dim blue light of impending sunrise.  Dani woke up and stumbled to the bathroom, cursing herself for the post-liquor buzzing in her head… until she remembered.  She smiled into a tall glass of water in the kitchen as the hazy tequila and vodka memories came back to her.  

 As she climbed back into bed, Rachel stirred.

 “Mmmm,” she mumbled, and rolled over.

 Rachel tucked her head into the space between Santana’s shoulder and neck, and Dani watched the blankets ripple next to her as Rachel and Santana’s legs intertwined.  

 As Santana wrapped her arm around Rachel to pull her closer, Dani felt a hollow space opening up in the pit of her stomach.  

 Suddenly all the memories she had just been smiling about seemed like nothing but manifestations of the worst idea ever, and one thought broke through explicitly in the dread:

 What have I done?

 


	2. Chapter 2

For only an instant, she thought it was Finn.   

She sighed and snuggled into the body surrounding her.

 It took a moment to realize that the weight of the hand on her hip was too insubstantial, the pressure of each fingertip too soft.  The weight of the body against her was too slight, and the scent was too sweet.  

  _Santana_.

 Rachel’s eyes flew open; the rest of her froze, listening.  Two sets of lungs breathed regularly, heavily, falling in and out of synchrony.  She lifted the hand from her hip, untangled her legs from Santana’s, and slipped silently from beneath the covers.

 

**

Santana opened her eyes at the sound of the clanging of the loft door.   She frowned sleepily at the morning chill creeping up where there was very recently body heat.  

 She rolled slowly to her back, patchwork memories coming back to her.  Next to her, Dani was blinking awake.  Santana rolled to her side and kissed her lips.

 "Morning,” she said.

 Dani's arms wrapped around her.  "Welcome back, stranger," she rasped, voice gravelly from sleep and last night's alcohol.

 Santana snuggled her head into Dani’s chest.  "Stranger?" she asked sleepily.  

 "I missed you,” Dani said, kissing the top of her head.   “This side of the bed got a little cold in the night."

 "I thought anywhere you went was automatically hot,” Santana smiled.

 “Nice line,” Dani said, gently tickling Santana’s side.  “You hung over?”

 “Mmmm,” Santana said, evaluating the state of her head and her stomach.  “Too early to say.  But," she added, smacking her lips and opening her jaw repeatedly, "My tongue definitely feels like a dead leaf.”

 “And somehow, I still find you sexy,” Dani said.  “So.  Did y’all sleep okay over there?”

 "I… yeah," Santana answered, a little puzzled.  "I mean, I think we all passed out pretty hard, didn’t we?"

 "Mmhmm.  It was nice of you," Dani said, walking her fingers down the length of Santana's arm.  "To hold her all night.  Making sure to make her feel comfortable after all that."

 "What can I say?” Santana said, rolling to her belly and resting her chin on Dani’s chest. “I'm the nicest bitch in town."

 "So where is she?" Dani asked, and indicated toward the door with her head.

 Santana raised herself up to her elbow.  “Bolted."

 Dani pursed her lips.  "That seems bad.”  

 “Yeah.”

 “Should we text her?"

 “No,” Santana said pensively, sitting up and running her fingers across her hair to smooth her bed head.  "I think this particular brand of awkwardness needs to be dealt with in person.  We both have the brunch today, so."

 Dani nodded.  "You're so lucky," she said through a yawn, stretching her arms over her head.  "You get to put on that sexy red uniform and haul your ass into Manhattan and sing for the Sunday tourists, and all I get to do is stay here all warm and naked and go back to sleep."

 "I fucking hate you," Santana said, throwing the blankets over Dani’s head.  "I'm gonna go take a shower."

 "Hey, wait," Dani said, catching Santana's wrist as she slid from the bed.   "Are you for real okay?  Is it going to be super weird at work?"

 Santana paused.  "You know what? I'm good.  I thought I was going to wake up nauseated and full of self-loathing, like back when I used to sleep with high school boys.  But. . . I'm good.”

 “No regrets, then?”

 “Oh my God,” Santana said, rolling her eyes.  “Are you kidding? The images in my head of you in action?  Let's just say,” she said, lowering her lips to Dani’s ear,  “My shower might take longer this morning.”

 Dani smiled and squirmed at Santana’s breath in her ear.   "Was that your favorite part?  Watching me?"

 "Yes, ma'am.”

 “Mmm, good to know,” Dani said.  “Have fun."

 "I will."

 "Hey,” Dani said as Santana was almost out the door.  “I love you."

 "I love you, too."

 Dani smiled to herself as the water started running in the bathroom, the panic in her stomach receding with Santana’s words in her ears. 

 

**

As the brunch crowd began to thin out ahead of the Sunday matinees, Rachel and Santana found themselves with fewer and fewer chores standing between them and the inevitable conversation.

 When Santana spotted Rachel sitting at the bar organizing sweetener dishes, it was time to rip the Band Aid off.  

 She slid onto the stool next to Rachel.  “Sooooooo.  What's new?"  

 Rachel startled and sent tiny pink, yellow, and blue rectangles flying.  

 She gave Santana an embarrassed smile and a small shrug.  “Nothing.”

 "Oh?  Nothing new and different?  Now see, that's not what I heard," Santana said, picking a pink package out of her hair and tossing it onto the counter.

 Rachel covered her face with her hands, peeking at Santana through her fingers.  "What did you hear?"

 "Oh, I heard a LOT," Santana said with a smile. Rachel buried her head in her forearms.

 “You walked right into that,” Santana noted, resting her elbow on the bar and her head in her hand.  "You know," she said, "I never would have pegged Rachel Berry as the fuck and run type.  I mean, no note on the pillow, no 'thanks for the good time' on the refrigerator white board, nothing.  Now, call me old-fashioned, but I think when someone and her super hot girlfriend get you drunk and convince you to have a three-way, you could at least put on a pot of coffee for them before you head out on your Sunday morning walk of shame."

 "I wasn't ready to talk about it," Rachel said into her forearms.

 "Talk?  We didn't want to talk, we just wanted some gratitude.  Roses on the nightstand, three course breakfast in bed, that sort of thing."

 "How was Dani this morning?" Rachel asked, raising her head to peek over her arms.  "Is everything, you know, good?"

 Santana shrugged.  "Other than the distinct lack of appreciation, she's fine.  You're the only one who couldn't take the heat this morning."  She poked Rachel in the ribs.  

 "Well, I’m sure someday I’ll be able to look at either of you without blushing."

 "Ehh, take your time.  I know it takes a while to process all of this," Santana said with a sweep of her hand down her body, and Rachel's cheeks reddened.

 "I just can't stop thinking about how weird it is," Rachel said, just as the silence threatened to become awkward.  "Imagine telling our sophomore year selves this was going to happen a few years later."

 Santana laughed.  "Shit, I would have been totally horrified.  We're talking like Oedipus levels of hell-to-the-no on that prophecy.  Like, I'd be sitting here eyeless right now. But," she said with a shrug, “Things change.”  

 Rachel smiled weakly.  "As long as you don’t regret it.”

 “I was afraid I would,” Santana admitted.  “I don’t.  At least not yet, it depends how annoying you are about it.”

 Rachel wiped her palms on her skirt.  “So - so what do we do now?”

 "Uh, well I'm gonna take that table in your section because my tips have sucked today and you have a mess to clean up,” Santana said, indicating all the sugar packages.  “And then?  We go back to normal.  Or, as normal as Rachel Berry can get.  I'm not looking for miracles here. All right, Berry?"

 “All right, Santana.”

 

**

 They got home from work just as Dani was setting the table for dinner.

 "You cooked?" Santana asked, breezing through the door and kissing her girlfriend on the cheek.  

 "I did," Dani said.  "Somehow I worked it into my busy schedule of lying around."

 "Ugghh, I love you, I'm so starving," Santana said, tossing her jacket onto the couch and sitting down at the table.

 "Rachel?" Dani said, noticing Rachel had made it only about two feet inside the door frame.  "There's plenty of salad and the pasta's vegan.  Would you like to join us?"

 Rachel started to shake her head no.

 "Wait, I'm sorry," Dani interrupted her.  "I meant to ask if you wanted to go into the bathroom and listen to us eat for a while and _then_ join us."

Santana spit water onto the kitchen table.  Rachel accepted the teasing with a wry smile.

"Sorry, Rachel, I had to," Dani said with a wide grin.  "But seriously, have a seat."

"Thanks, that's okay," Rachel said.  "I want to get ahead on school work tonight since I have rehearsal all week."

"Booooo," Santana called after Rachel as she headed into her room and closed the curtain behind her.

She settled in under the covers with a textbook perfunctorily open next to her, and signed into Netflix.  Two hours later, she woke up to a silent apartment.  She tiptoed out to the darkened kitchen.  

Dani’s pasta was still on the stove, a paper towel with a scrawled “help yourselves!” across the lid, presumably for her and for Kurt, wherever he was.  She assessed her grumbling belly and opened the lid, but changed her mind and deposited the pot in the fridge instead.  Sighing, she took the dirty dishes from the table and began filling the kitchen sink with hot water.

 

**

“Kurt, get your skinny rear end out here!” Santana yelled from the couch.  

“Okay, geez,” Kurt said, emerging from the bathroom and plopping himself into the armchair.  “I peed as fast as I could.”

“Not fast enough,” Santana said with a glare, reaching forward to the coffee table and shoveling a handful of popcorn in her mouth.   “We need to get started, because Piper and Alex are totally having sex in this episode.  I saw it on Tumblr.”

Kurt rolled his eyes, and Dani patted Santana’s knee.  “Keep it in your pants, babe.”

“I thought you didn’t want to be spoiled.  Why are you checking the internet for plot points?” Rachel chimed in from the opposite armchair.

Santana sighed.  “Rachel, let me explain a thing to you.  I am a hardworking American citizen.  I pay my taxes.  I recycle.  I refrain from dumping milkshakes onto old ladies’ heads on a daily basis even when I really want to, and do you know why?  Because it’s the right thing to do, and that’s the kind of woman Santana Lopez is.  And you know what?  I have needs, ones that deserve to be met.  One of those needs is to know when I’m gonna get to see the hot girls gettin’ down on my TV.  I don’t think that’s so much to ask, especially since I was dumb enough to sign this ‘we all watch Season 2 together’ pact, and now I have to wait for you and Kurt’s slow asses.”

“Santana for the last time, we’re busy, not slow,” Kurt corrected her.

“Some of us are significantly less busy now,” Santana said, throwing a glare at Rachel, “And still don’t manage to make time for their roommates in their busy moping schedule.”

“Santana, don’t,” Kurt warned.

Dani scrunched her nose.  “Also, you said ‘hot girls’.  When are you going to accept that only one of them is actually hot?”  

“You know what, I’m tired of you and your Piper hate,” Santana said, throwing her head back in exasperation.  “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, you wouldn’t do any better in prison than she is.”

“Uhhh, excuse me, yes I would,” Dani disagreed, “You and me would be ruling the world at Litchfield.  We’d be in the kitchen living large with Mama Gloria, sex in the showers and in between the church pews, maybe mixing things up now and then with Flaca and Maritza. . .”

“Hold up,” Santana said indignantly.  “Why did I go to jail with you?”

“Because I ratted you out so you could be just like your girlfriend, Piper,” Dani said, and stuck her tongue out at Santana.  

“Make it a little more obvious you want to be Alex in this situation.”

“Well, she is the hot one,” Kurt interjected.  “Even I know that.”

“It’s true,” Rachel agreed. "Her look says 'I'm a rebel, but a smart one.' Very aesthetically appealing."

“You’re all wrong about everything ever, but whatever, it’s fine.  The hottest one on the whole show ain’t Alex, or Piper, it’s Poussey, and you know I’m right.  I’m right.”

“She is gorgeous, but she's second,” Dani said.

“Please, who are you on about now?”

“Uhhh, Sophia?” Dani said.   “And you know I’M right.  And Red is fucking fierce too, I could make a case for that, at least last season, but no.  Sophia’s like ‘all you peasants with your drama and your bullshit, that’s fine, I’ll occupy myself making you look slightly less grungy until I get outta here.  Then I’m gonna buy a collection of dresses none of you could ever pull off, and none of you are ever gonna see me again except on TV.’  Bitch is flawless.”

“She’s criminally underused this season,” Kurt added.  

“If that pun was on purpose, Hummel, I swear to fucking God,” Santana said, yanking a pillow out from behind Dani just so she could throw it at him.

“It wasn’t, I swear it wasn’t!”

“Speaking of underused,” Rachel chimed in, “Surely they could find ways to have Annie Golden sing more often to make use of her Broadway background.”  

Santana groaned.  “Only you would dwell on that.  This is why I had to stop watching Grey’s Anatomy with you.  Get out.  Just get out of here.”

“Wait, guys, we’re leaving out poor Kurt,” Dani interjected.  “Kurt, are there any dudes worth talking about other than the cute little baby daddy guy?  Like okay, if you had to – Larry, Pornstache, or… I don’t even know.  Other Pornstache?” 

Kurt wrinkled his face.  “I’d do Alex or Sophia before any of ‘em.”

Santana waved her hands to quell the laughter.  “All right, all right, enough chit chat about Kurt’s highly implausible latent bisexuality.  Let’s watch this shit before we’re the last people on Earth to see it.”  She grabbed the remote from the coffee table and settled in against Dani.

“Oh my God!” Kurt blurted out as soon as the opening credits began.

“What?” Rachel asked, sitting up straight when she saw he was looking at his phone.  “Is everything okay?  Is it your dad?”

“No, it’s fine, my dad’s fine.  It’s.. . . I just got a text from that guy, Terrence.  He just got a callback for  _A New Brain_ and wants to know if I’m free to run lines with him.  Tonight!”

 "Wait, he’s the one from dance class who can do the thing with his leg you were telling me about?  Yeah, Kurt, you have to go,” Rachel said.  “You’ve been talking about him for weeks.”

 “Uhh, excuse me?” Santana said, hitting the pause button in exasperation.  “First of all, you can’t just drop everything and run over to this guy’s apartment at 10pm.  Helloooo, desperate!  Second of all, you have made a commitment to your roommates and more importantly, to fake TV lesbians, and we all expect that you honor that commitment.  Back me up, ladies.”

 “Sweetie,” Dani said gently, “Maybe Kurt can watch the episode by himself later tonight or tomorrow and then we can all resume together tomorrow night.”

 Santana slumped in her seat.  “It’s not the same.”  

 “Go ahead, Kurt,” Dani said.  “We’ll be okay.”

 “Yes, fine, go on your man-date.  Just know, Hummel, that if you hold me back tomorrow night, you will be hearing from my lawyers for breach of contract.”

 Kurt stood up and jumped in place a few times.  “Thank you for understanding, Santana,” he said.

 “I don’t,” she scowled, even as he kissed her cheek as he swept by into his room to change.

 “You would if you saw him shirtless,” he called out from behind his drawn curtain.

 Santana crossed her arms over her chest.

 “Guess it’s girls’ night,” Dani said, wiggling her eyebrows and stealing the remote from Santana.  “You guys ready?”

 

**

 “Damn it, Hummel!” Santana yelled into the darkness as the episode ended, and threw another pillow, this time in the general vicinity of the television.  “I hope you’re having terrible sex right now!”

 Dani and Rachel exchanged an amused look.  

 “Oh, did you want to watch another episode or something?” Rachel asked.

 “Well, we can’t do that.  But, I know what’ll make you feel better,” Dani said, popping up from the couch.  “In honor of Piper and Alex, why don’t we continue to make this the gayest night ever?  Who wants to play Tomb Raider?”

 “Isn’t that what you guys were doing the other night when she broke the coffee table?”  Rachel asked, nudging it with her foot to demonstrate how it tottered from side to side.

 “I didn’t break it,” Santana said.  “I like, slightly bent one of the legs with my foot.”

 “Yeah, she kicked it,” Dani said.  “You know, for a game where you put your finger on a button and wiggle it around to control an attractive woman, I don’t get why she’s so bad at it.”

 “I’m under no obligation to wiggle any of my fingers tonight, Guerrero, so I’d watch it.”

 Feeling extremely weary at this moment in time, Rachel declined to play but elected to stay in her spot on the chair.  She was pretty sure most video games didn’t include this much physical contact between the players, especially when only one person could play at a time, but Santana and Dani’s version of “playing Tomb Raider” included real life elbows to the ribs, shoving, tickling, and competitive footsies all over the coffee table.  She watched passively from behind her iPad, figuring at some point this was going to devolve, and either she or they were going to have to make a hasty retreat from the common area.  

 Until then, she was comfy and decided to wait it out.

 But when it got strangely quiet, she peered over the top of her eBook to find Santana standing over her, hands on her hips.

 “What did I do now?” Rachel asked with a sigh. "Are you kicking me out?  Santana, this is supposed to be a common area."

 “You didn't do anything, this time, other than being a major party pooper.  It’s time to get your ass over here and play.”

 Santana took the tablet out of Rachel’s hands and yanked her to her feet, then deposited her next to Dani on the couch.  Dani put the controller in Rachel’s hands.  

 “What do I do?” Rachel asked warily.  

 “See the hot chick with the gun?” Dani asked.  “That’s you.  Go shoot stuff.”

 “I don’t know how!” Rachel said in alarm as the game began and things started flying at her.  

 “Just push buttons, you’ll figure it out,” Dani said.

 Rachel’s character died five times.

 “Okay, maybe I’m gonna help you,” Dani offered when she finished laughing.  She put her hands over Rachel’s on top of the controller.  “Okay, this is forward.”  She pushed Rachel’s thumb toward the screen.  “Turn this way to aim.  And do this to shoot.”  She depressed Rachel’s finger and the gun onscreen discharged.  

 “I got him!” Rachel exclaimed.

 “I mean, I got him,” Dani corrected her, “But I guess your hands were there, if you want to take some slight credit.”

 Rachel yanked the controller away from Dani.  “Let’s DO this!”

 Rachel kept dying, albeit enthusiastically; Santana died slightly less often, a fact which she held high over Rachel’s head.  When the two of them got bored of dying in the same place for twenty minutes, Dani would take over and get them to the next checkpoint so they could die in a different place for a while.

 Rachel was convinced she’d be dying less often if Dani’s legs, bare except for the tiny plaid PJ shorts she was wearing, weren’t brushing against hers and Santana’s indiscriminately on the coffee table.

 When Dani and Santana decided it was time to go to bed, Rachel sighed in the direction of her iPad.  So, ultimately, another night ending with no company except the glow of the screen and the sounds of giggling and moaning that peeked in between the songs on her headphones.  

 She didn’t have to stay here, that was true.  She could go to a bar.  She could go to the studio at NYADA, or the library, or a late night movie.  She could call someone to hang out or even find someone who was awake online, maybe someone from back home.  That could be nice.

 She didn’t do any of those things.  

 She stood in the living room with a comforter wrapped around her, and listened to her own small voice squeak out words that felt alien, horrifying, and absolutely life-and-death necessary.  

 “Can I come with you?” she asked Santana and Dani as they gathered up their dishes from the coffee table.   “To.. to your room.  Can I come with you?”

 

**

 “To… do… what?” Dani turned slowly to face Rachel.  

 “I, uh.”  Rachel cleared her throat and straightened her spine.  

 The refrigerator hummed really, _really_ loudly.

 “I mean, it was fun last time, right?” Rachel finally continued.

 Seriously, you could hear the crickets all the way in the Poconos.

 “It was,” Dani agreed.  

 “It was also six months ago,” Santana said.    

 “So?” Rachel said impatiently, desperate for them to either accept or let her retreat in humiliation.  “We never talked about whether it was a one-time thing, or what.  There’s a term ‘friends with benefits,’ and it must exist because people do it, right?  Well, we’re friends, aren’t we?”  She hugged herself tight inside her comforter.  

 Santana looked at Dani and Dani looked at Santana, and there was information exchanged that Rachel wasn’t party to until Dani looked at Rachel, and spoke.

 “Yeah, all right.  Let’s go.”

 

***

 Santana and Dani held hands in the darkened apartment as they made their way out of the living room.  Rachel shuffled behind them into Santana’s room, still wrapped in her comforter, following their silhouettes.  

 Dani secured the curtain behind them, and switched on the lamp on Santana's dresser, filling the room with a warm, dim light.

 She approached Santana.  "Arms up," she said, sliding her hands up the back of Santana's red pajama tank top.  Santana lifted her elbows up to shoulder height, closing her eyes at the touch of Dani's hands on her skin.

 "I don't know why she insists on wearing this around the house," Dani said over her shoulder.   "I've told her they look even better without one," she said as she unlatched Santana’s bra.

 Rachel had no comment to make on that.  She wondered, though, as Dani stuffed Santana's bra into one of their horribly disorganized dresser drawers, if they would notice if she sneaked out to brush her teeth really fast.  

 Probably they would, she concluded.  She stayed put.  

 Dani took down Santana’s PJ bottoms, leaving her in only the tank top and underwear.  (Black, lacy.  Not that Rachel was looking -- except maybe enough to feel dramatically unsexy in her baggy white t-shirt and ratty sweatpants.  With no underwear, she nervously recalled.)    

 Dani stood for a moment, surveying the situation, chewing on the corner of her bottom lip.

 "Okay," she said assuredly, as though she had just decided she agreed with herself.  She turned back to Santana. “Come with me,” she said with a smile, and led her to the edge of the bed.  

 “Wait here,” Dani whispered, and bent down to kiss her lips.  

 Dani had a certain smell, Rachel had long ago noticed, some amorphous combination of shampoo and lotion or perfume or something, recognizable enough that Rachel always knew immediately when she was over, even if she was out of sight.  It was growing stronger with every step she was taking toward Rachel.

 “Hey,” Dani said softly, bringing herself within inches of Rachel’s person.  The scent, it was definitely lilacs.  Maybe a hint of vanilla?   

 “Hey,” Rachel said back, low and soft.  She hugged the comforter more tightly around her small frame, but her skin buzzed as Dani hovered just outside her personal space.   

 “So, um, Rachel,” Dani said, taking hold the blanket at each of Rachel’s shoulders and pulling her against her body, “You and I are going to play a game.”

 Rachel glanced at Santana, who sat on the bed, her hands resting behind her, legs outstretched and crossed.

 “Oh, she knows this game,” Dani assured her, holding Rachel immobile against her by her comforter.  “It’s called…  ‘you don’t do anything -- anything -- unless I say you can.’”

 “That’s -- that’s kind of unwieldy,” Rachel said.  

 “Excuse me?”

 “The name, it’s really long for a game title.”

 “Rachel,” Dani whispered.  She leaned forward until her lips were nearly brushing Rachel’s.  “Did I say you could talk?”  

 Rachel shook her head.

“Then shut. The fuck. Up.”

Rachel understood instantly, of course, that Dani was in _character._  But still, she wobbled a little on her feet.  

Dani smiled again, but this time not with the wide, happy grin that Rachel was used to.  Her eyes stared Rachel down, and her posture, with the way her chin led, made her seem much taller; Rachel could imagine this was the Dani that Santana had to face down when they argued, the demeanor that went with the anger that the headphones and pillows couldn't muffle during the inevitable lovers' quarrels.  

She wobbled a little more when she imagined how these attributes could play out on that bed a few feet away.  She lifted her gaze from Dani's mouth to her eyes and smiled.

Dani watched this train of thought play out on Rachel's face, watched as Rachel's jaw and shoulders relaxed, as her widened eyes narrowed and softened, and the corners of her mouth turned up.  She slid her hands across Rachel’s shoulders underneath the comforter, and sent it pooling on the ground around their feet.  

“You’re allowed to do two things,” she said, putting one hand behind Rachel's neck and one on her hip, guiding her backwards until her back was flat against Santana’s bedroom wall.  “You’re allowed to say ‘stop’. . .”

She trailed off to focus on rolling her thigh slowly and firmly upward against Rachel’s center, pinning her in place.

“And you’re allowed to moan,” she finished.

Rachel’s lips parted in surprise, in reaction to the cold of the wall, in titillation, just in time for Dani’s to meet them.  

Nothing tentative about it, Dani’s kisses were immediately warm and deep.  She filled Rachel’s mouth with her tongue, pushed her head against the wall behind her with the pressure of her lips.  Rachel inhaled sharply; she couldn’t exhale completely for how hard Dani pressed into her with delicious contact everywhere, mouth to mouth, collarbone to collarbone, belly to belly, thigh to clit.  

The kissing made Rachel’s hands want to rise from her sides where she’d held them awkwardly, but now that she wanted to grasp at any part of this girl, she found her wrists pinned to the wall at her hips.  She thought that maybe she had to ask to use them, but there was no opportunity for her mouth to form words.

Despite the resistance at her wrists, the kisses remained unhurried.  Dani explored Rachel's mouth, and every tilt of her chin, every breath, every stroke of her tongue was deliberate.    

She massaged the underside of Rachel’s tongue, just behind her teeth, for forEVER.  She timed a shaky, outward breath with Rachel’s lips falling open.  

Rachel’s legs went a bit weak.  She retained less and less weight in them and more and more rested on Dani’s thigh.

Her arms strained against their confinement.  Her head wanted to fall backward, but there was a wall, so instead her chin protruded and Dani took it into her mouth, sucking down the length of her jawline.  Then, maddeningly lazily, she trailed down her jugular, pulling, sucking in a way that assured Rachel that she’d be reaching for the heavy duty stage makeup in the morning.  

Then the lips were gone and instead there was just breath -- hot, slow exhale after exhale, across her right ear… tickling, echoing.  

She squirmed, anticipating.  When the warm, wet mouth finally surrounded her earlobe, she moaned.

“You can touch me now,” Dani whispered into Rachel’s tingling ear.  

She let Rachel’s left wrist go free and slid her right hand up Rachel’s back from hip to shoulder blade.

Rachel’s hand flew to the side of Dani’s face, bringing their lips back together.  She rocked her hips against Dani’s leg.  Her tongue, pushing back for the first time, crossed the threshold of Dani’s lips.  And it didn’t escape Rachel’s notice that Dani liked it, because the choked sigh and the nails in the skin of her back told her loud and clear, but that wasn’t permitted in the rules and so Rachel found her head secured back against the wall with a palm against her forehead.

“I did NOT say you could do that,” Dani said, breathlessly holding her index finger up in Rachel’s face.

Dani’s eyes were heavy-lidded, but blazing.  Rachel honestly wasn’t sure if this was the character or she was legitimately pissed at the breach of the (completely arbitrary) rules, but couldn’t bring herself to give a fuck.  The way Dani was going after her, there was no way this wasn’t ending in fucking, so what did it matter?  She grabbed the hand on her forehead and tossed it away.  Then she lolled back against the wall, eyes locked with Dani’s, and waited.

Dani grabbed Rachel firmly at the hips.  “Take off your fucking shirt.”

Rachel complied, dropping her t-shirt nonchalantly at Dani’s feet.  

“Santana,” Dani called out.  “Come here.  I need your help.”

Santana slid from the bed.  

As she sauntered toward them, visions of violence threatened in broken Spanish flitted through Rachel’s head, probably something to do with how she had been heavily, enthusiastically making out with Santana’s girlfriend.

But Santana regarded Rachel wordlessly.  Dani greeted her with a kiss, with red lips already hot with friction.  

“You are so beautiful,” she murmured into Santana’s neck, and pulled the band from Santana’s hair to let it fall onto her shoulders.  She put her hands on Santana’s waist underneath her tank top and lifted it over her head as she guided her backwards.

“This is going to be cold,” she said with an apologetic smile.  “I’m sorry.”

Santana squeaked as the skin of her back met the wall next to Rachel.  “Shh, sorry, I’m sorry,” Dani repeated, scrunching her nose.  “Give me two minutes, baby, and you won’t care anymore, okay?”  

Dani put her lips against Santana’s ear.  “You’re the good cop,” she whispered.

One corner of Santana’s mouth flickered upward in acknowledgement.  

Rachel found herself being shuffled sideways and then backwards.   Abruptly, her back was pressed into soft breasts, nipples noticeable against her shoulder blades.  

She stiffened and forced herself not to recoil.  

“She won’t listen to me,” Dani announced to Santana, “So I need you to hold her arms.”  Rachel felt soft hands slide down her biceps and fingers encircle her forearms just above the wrist.  

Dani smiled at Rachel again, this time as she stripped down to her panties, dark grey boyshort ones that didn’t contain the bottom half of her ass.  Rachel felt Santana sigh behind her as that almost-naked silhouette appeared in front of them.

Dani dropped to her knees in front of Rachel.

Rachel’s cheeks felt hot instantaneously as the scenario Dani had choreographed came into sharp focus.   _Oh God._

Dani took the elastic of Rachel’s sweatpants between her fingertips and folded it down once, exposing her hipbones.  She put her mouth on the apex of the left one, and as she sucked there, Rachel felt the fingers of Santana’s right hand scratching up and down, up and down, on her forearm.  

 The tip of Dani’s tongue trailed across Rachel’s lower abdomen on its way to her other hip, and it tickled _horribly_.  She bucked her hips involuntarily, twisted side to side against Santana, the scratch of lace noticeable against her skin.  .  

 “Stop it,” Dani commanded, and used the palms of her hands to steady Rachel’s hips, planting her fingers firmly into the sides of her ass and pushing her backwards against Santana.  

 Her hips now confined, Rachel’s arms struggled against Santana’s hold. Santana, needing a better grip, hooked her left arm between Rachel's body and her elbows, and draped her right across the front of Rachel's chest, pulling her backwards against her.

 "Y’okay?" she whispered almost inaudibly in Rachel's ear.

 Rachel managed to gather the cognitive function needed to nod.

 As Dani folded Rachel’s waistband down another roll, Santana rested her chin on Rachel’s shoulder, watching her stomach muscles strain while her girlfriend’s mouth worked back and forth across them.  

 One more roll down of the elastic, and Dani’s mouth hit the tiniest trace of stubble.  Rachel’s clit burned in anticipation; she could just barely feel the tickle of hot breath on it now.  Sweat broke out across her forehead and made slick the junction between the small of her back and Santana’s lower belly.

 She grimaced in frustration as Dani’s tongue tortured her, too high on her body to do anything but tickle.  She tensed her legs and pushed herself backwards into Santana, grunting in frustration.

 “Okay, I'm setting your arms free,” Santana said, and released her grip.  “Don’t do anything stupid.”

 She changed her hold to brace the sides of Rachel’s body with her elbows and wrap her hands around her shoulders from the front.

 Rachel’s newly freed hands naturally went to Dani’s hair, and the sides of her face.

 “Careful,” Santana murmured in Rachel’s ear.

 Rachel groaned. There had to be permission for that? She took her hands away.  Dani moved her mouth two inches higher in response to the infraction.  

 “Fuuuuck,” Rachel breathed.  She reached above her head with her left arm and latched onto Santana’s hair at the base of her neck.  With her right hand, she reached across her body and grasped Santana’s hand on her shoulder.  

 Santana, thoroughly enjoying the fact that Rachel was about to lose her fucking mind, cooed into Rachel’s ear.

 “You know, she _wants_ to fuck you.”

 Rachel moaned and Dani tickled her inner folds, now exposed, with the tip of her tongue, as if to confirm.

 “See,” Santana said.  “She wants to taste you.  But,” she continued, speaking with her lips right behind Rachel’s earlobe, “You have to play the game right.”

 Rachel took the direction and stopped squirming, putting her energy into moaning instead.  Dani rewarded her by yanking down her pajama pants and removing them altogether.   

 Then she opened her, pulling her apart gently with her thumbs.   She flicked her tongue across Rachel’s exposed clit, steadily but lightly, finding a rhythm of about once per second.  Too slowly, too lightly.  Over and over. . . over and over, but too slowly, too lightly.  

 Rachel’s moans turned into whimpers.  She couldn't be asked not to move anymore; she writhed in Santana’s arms, and murmured Dani’s name like a prayer.

 A few minutes into it and she’d completely surrendered, her head thrown back against Santana’s collarbone, her body nearly limp except for her arched back, trying to force the intensity of contact that Dani, through (in Santana's opinion) a superhuman feat of self-restraint, absolutely fucking refused to give her.

 Santana’s hands pressed into Rachel’s stomach.  With her fingers, she drew spirals just inches above where Dani was finally, slowly, beginning to apply more pressure to Rachel’s clit.  

 Beginning to sense the outer reaches of satisfaction, Rachel turned her head, craned her neck, and found Santana’s lips.

 As Santana kissed her back, her hands grasped at Rachel’s belly.  She dug her nails in to stop herself from trailing lower, encroaching on Dani's efforts.

 “Please,” Rachel pleaded into Santana’s mouth, finally realizing it was only Santana who could end this torment.

 Santana didn’t break the kiss, but Rachel felt the smirk.  Santana dropped one hand _ever-so-slowly_ from Rachel’s stomach and wove her fingers into Dani’s hair.  She gave a tiny little push, and Rachel’s clit was enveloped in warm, soft, wetness, and _oh god -- oh my god_ , there it was, the friction she’d been craving finally was there, with Dani pressing her clit up into her body in long, languid strokes.

 Santana used the fingers of her right hand to hold Rachel open for Dani, and wrapped her left arm around Rachel’s body at the ribs.   

 Dani draped one of Rachel’s legs over her shoulder for deeper access. Rachel’s thigh muscles jerked against her will, trembled against Dani’s neck.  

 Santana took Rachel’s right hand and guided it to Dani’s left, which rested on her hip, and watched as they interlocked their fingers.  She grabbed Rachel's left hand with her own.

 Rachel moaned the word “fuck” about a billion times as Dani sucked her clit into her mouth, massaging it between her lips and tongue, making a beeline for the climax Rachel was dying for.  Rachel broke out into goosebumps.  

 “ _That’s it, Rachel_ ,” Santana encouraged at a whisper.

 Rachel came with a guttural cry and choked out Dani’s name right afterward, dissolving completely against Santana.  She whimpered and rocked against Dani’s tongue, and Dani stayed there, letting her savor the friction long after the orgasm had faded.  

 When Rachel came down, Dani stood up, shaking out the stiffness in her legs.  Rachel threw her arms around her neck.

 “Oh my God, thank you,” she said.  

 Dani returned the unexpected hug and smiled, amused, at Santana over Rachel’s shoulder.  Santana rolled her eyes backward and mouthed the word _fuck_ at Dani.  

  _I know_ , Dani mouthed back.  

 “Uhh, thank you back,” Dani said aloud, to Rachel.  “Rachel, that was hot as fuck.”

 Rachel pulled back from the hug and even still couldn't stop herself from looking at the floor.

 “So, do you still want to make fun of my game?” Dani asked.

 “It still needs a better name,” Rachel said shakily.

 “All right, well, I’ll work on that,” Dani said, stretching her arms above her head.  “But right now I’m getting into that bed.  And without these, because guess what, they’re soaking wet,” she said, sliding her underwear down her hips and onto the floor.  “Who’s coming with me?”

 Rachel found herself sort of unable to move, so Santana grabbed her by the hand and they followed Dani into the bed.

 

**

 Rachel had gone to the bathroom.  Santana was about eighty percent asleep, face down on the mattress where Dani had just finished with her.  Dani sat next to her, knees drawn up to her chest, one hand on Santana’s back.  

 “Hey babe, I’m gonna go get water,” she said softly.

 “Mmmph,” Santana acknowledged.

 Dani was standing in the hallway outside of Santana’s room, sipping her glass of water, when Rachel returned from the bathroom.

 Rachel smiled as she approached.  “Aren’t you afraid Kurt’s going to come home and see you naked?” she asked.

 “Not really,” Dani shrugged.  

 “Well, I admire your confidence,” Rachel said.

 “Thanks.  So, hey Rachel,” she said, positioning herself between Rachel and the door to Santana’s room.   “We need to talk about something.”

 “Just you and me?”

 “Yeah.”

 “Uh.  Okay."

 “So, I mean, I think it's safe to say I speak for Santana, too, when I say we don’t mind if this is not the last time this happens.”

 “I -- no, me, either,” Rachel acknowledged.

 “Good,” Dani said, “That’s definitely good with me.  But if that’s true, Rachel, we gotta be clear on something.”

 Rachel held her breath in the dark, wishing very badly she could see Dani’s face instead of shadows.  “Okay,” she said.

 “Santana and I are a couple.”

 Rachel nodded.  “Yes, I’m aware.”  

 “And we’re committed to each other.   And because of that, there need to be boundaries.”

 “I -- Dani, I know, of course.  Did I do something to overstep? I know I was forward, but you both said yes, so--"

 “No, that’s not it.  That was totally hot and ballsy," Dani said,  "And trust me, everything in there was all good.   If it wasn’t, I would have told you.  But, I need to be honest about what needs to happen next.”

 “What needs to happen next?” Rachel asked, her stomach falling to her knees because she already knew the answer.

 “My girlfriend and I need to fall asleep alone together.”

 “Of course," Rachel said quietly.  "I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have presumed to come back here after we were done with -- done.”

 “You don’t have to be sorry, Rachel.  I know that we invited you last time, but that was a long time ago.  I just think it's best that there's no, you know. . . blurriness.   About what’s going on here.”

 “No, there’s no blurriness,” Rachel said.  “I’ll see you in the morning, Dani.  Thank you for… for everything.”  Rachel turned hastily and retreated down the hall toward her room.

 Dani finished sipping her glass of water in the hallway, and then joined Santana in bed.  

 “Where’s Berry?” Santana asked groggily as Dani pulled the covers up over the two of them.  “Did she fall in?”

 “Actually," Dani said, "I asked her to sleep in her own room."

 “Oh,” Santana said, taking a moment to let that sink in.  "Why?  Isn’t that kind of mean?”

 “How is it mean?” Dani asked.  “This is our bed.”

 “Yeah, that she just had sex in, like a lot.  Kicking her out right afterward feels pretty cold, doesn’t it?”

 “Well, I didn't kick her out, Santana.  And I don’t think there was anything mean about what we just let her be a part of.  Listen babe, one random night six months ago, before we were super serious is one thing.  But if she wants to be our ‘friend-with-benefits’ or whatever at this point, I am down with that, but there have to be rules.  This is one of mine.”

 Santana rolled onto her back and took Dani's hand.  "You’re right.  And you’re smart, and you should cuddle me, pronto.”

 

**

 Alone in her room, Rachel stared at the ceiling, parsing the details of the blur that had been the last few hours.  Parts of her were shaky and weak; parts were aching and sore.  Her eyes burned from being awake so late.  Her mind raced. 

 

_(Hold onto my hips with your legs, Rachel – it helps me keep it in.  Is your view good, babe, or do you need us to move over?)_

 

 Despite the wrenching loneliness of being transported unexpectedly from a space overwhelmingly warm and alive to this cold, quiet desert of a room, as the memories flickered vividly in her mind, she was hard pressed to not count this among the best nights of her life.  

 

  _(Santana. . . God, Santana, YES. . . Rachel, bring your tits over here.  That’s good.  Santana, please…)_

 

 And despite everything that would follow in the next weeks, months, and years, that assessment wouldn’t really change.

 

  _(Do you feel her thighs shaking?  That means it's good, keep going.  Think about what felt good when I did it to you over at that wall. . .”)_

 

If this was the deal she had to take to get nights like these, she would take it, and easily.  It wasn’t so bad, really, having this time to reflect afterward…

 

_(Really, you’re still trying to be shy, Berry?  Do you know where my hand just was?  What’s the difference if this time you’re on your hands and knees?)_

 

She closed her eyes, rolled to her side and did her best to settle her mind into sleep.  When she woke up, it would be that much closer to tomorrow night.

 


End file.
